The technology is in place, and the visuals rival a home console release, but what about the actual game itself?

Last year, Capcom was quick to announce not one but two separate Resident Evil games for the upcoming Nintendo 3DS: Revelations and The Mercenaries 3D. While The Mercenaries is currently on target for a Spring release and Revelations sometime after that, it was Revelations that got a dedicated booth at this weekend's Nintendo World 2011 event, while The Mercenaries was relegated to a display-only demo unit in the corner of the hall. Despite this reversal, I feel there are far more unanswered questions surrounding Revelations than its sister project.

Much of Resident Evil: Revelations is a throwback to older titles in the series, given what Capcom showed in the brief demo this weekend. The lead characters are Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine, stars of the original Resident Evil. The action-oriented tactics of Resident Evil 4 and the cooperative play mechanics of Resident Evil 5 are gone. In their place is a more deliberately-paced, solitary adventure.

The demo began with Jill alone on a ship. The impact of the graphics, not just the 3D effect, was striking. For a series with a divisive gap between its home console iterations and its portable ones, Resident Evil: Revelations looks far closer to the former than the latter. The 3D enhancement was subtle but noticeable, although with such tight quarters there was precious little depth to exploit visually.

The controls were less impressive. After enjoying so much freedom in Resident Evil 5, returning to a single analog pad felt like a step backwards. It's possible to adjust the camera view with the touch screen, but important functions are mapped to the buttons, so holding the stylus is out of the question. When I attempted to use both, a painful hand cramp and the Capcom booth staff convinced me to abandon that idea.

Fortunately, the game seems geared more towards careful exploration than combat, so the controls are more a design choice than an oversight. When navigating narrow hallways, I didn't need to play with the camera, as it maintained a comfortable over-the-shoulder position that gave me just enough of a field of view to feel perpetually nervous. The sound effects added to my anxiety; a creaky ship at sea with moans and grunts echoing in the distance made me very uneasy.

Only one type of enemy appeared in the demo, and it wasn't very human. It walked around on two legs like a zombie, but looked more like a Licker with tendrils on its body and a large, open mouth. Combat remains a stop-and-shoot affair (EDIT: There is actually a way to move while aiming now. I apologize for not discovering this sooner). When I first saw a creature in the head (that's nautical speak for "toilet"), I had a bit of trouble aiming with the analog pad. Again, I had grown accustomed to having a right thumbstick like in Resident Evil 5. Luckily for me, Jill had unlimited ammo and regenerating health in the demo, so by the time I faced two monsters later on I had completely recovered.

After I defeated two monsters at once, the demo came to an abrupt end. There were no cutscenes -- no real dialogue. Only a prisoner locked in a cell gave any hint as to what the plot might include. The confusing E3 trailer showing on a loop at the booth didn't help matters: all the graphical advancements in the world seem incapable of enhancing the storytelling and scriptwriting in this series.

The biggest questions I have concerning Resident Evil: Revelations are not story-related, though. I got the hang of the controls quickly enough, but what of the supplemental functions? The demo offered no menus, no inventory, and no heads-up display at all. The touch screen was nearly useless. How these things work in the final product will be a major factor in playing and enjoying the full game. There's also the matter of quick-time events, a central component of recent entries in the series. Personally, I can't stand them, and if/how they are incorporated in the full game will matter a great deal.

Resident Evil: Revelations looks and feels so much like a home console release that it seems poised to deliver an authentic survival horror experience on the 3DS. Yet with all these looming questions, however, I'm forced to wonder if it will live up to its prestigious name.

Noooooo !!!!

I can live with the controls because I never had a problem with the originals controls but quick time events. It works in God of War because everything else rules but even with that game after a while I am like can't I just fight the bosses without these.

QTEs

have been in Resident Evil since part 4 (e.g. the boulder chase) but they weren´t as frequent or annoying as in other recent action games. If they don´t use them to finish off every second enemy I wouldn´t worry too much.

Speculation

The demo contained no QTEs. When a monster grabbed me, I had to press Y to shake it loose. That's it. However, considering how QTEs were in Resident Evil 4 and 5 and the Wii Chronicles games, I'm anticipating their presence here and dreading it. But that's just me.

No!

Lets see what he thinks of the psp2 -_-

Theres not even any texture mapping done on the enemies, and you criticizing the game? This game is obviously still in the works. Any absence of story telling cant be seen in a demo anyways. The booth was showing gameplay, which is what everyone is concerned with.

Yea, this is the only bad review of this thing, dont let this fool you.

stop and shoot?

Quote from some other gaming site (starts with an "i", ends on "gn"): "The game allows you to move while firing now. You do this by holding down L, which makes your character move in a strafing fashion. You can move in this fashion even when your gun is drawn and firing."

Let the poor S.T.A.Rs retire capcom :(

Capcom first pumped Chris with steroids, then turned Jill into a blonde, then gave Wesker a pretty meh death. I think it's time to let old heroes lie because not that I'm sick of them it's just that their faces do seem a little tired. Let Claire, Leon, Barry or even HUNK take the lead, or just take any average joe like Dead Space to use.

Capcom maybe should use the 3DS as a new frontier for another Resident Evil change. More horror less Action?

It´s much too early for any revelations!

Furthermore: Cutscenes and dialogue are usually the last things being implemented into a build. As Xynon said, this is more like a tech demo to show off the 3DS´s hardware capabilities.

I just hope they make good use of the system´s unique features, the touchscreen for one (where Deadly Silence could have used some improvement, even though it was a remake), but especially 3D. Forget subtlety, give me in-your-face splatter gore! I want to instinctivly reach for my cheek to wipe off the guts and chunks of brain! Mooore brain!!!

Well, this demo looks to be showcasing two things.

Tech and control.
If they both seem well for this short, limited demo. Not very concerning. If this was a launch release, then yeah, start worrying. No need to reveal the "revelation" before it's ready to...

Considering how fluently...

...The Mercenaries 3D seems to work so far, it's only to be hoped they don't fiddle too much with the concept.

Speaking of which, while the polygonal stuff looks absolutely amazing so far, there's a distinct lack of particle effects, with blood, explosions and stuff being depicted as what seems to be very rough placeholders. Let's hope there's some improvement to come in this regard.

Resident Evil/Biohazard. Good games. Reeeeeeally bad films.

I just watched Resident Evil Afterlife and logging on here right after I noticed that 1up's advertising space is dedicated to it. Man did that film suck. Really, really badly. I wanted to like it. I tried to like it. There was no way. Who funds films like that? It sucked so much I can hardly believe it. Sorry, a bit off comment I know but it was so bad I felt the need.

famitsu

Hmm

This is the first negative impression I've seen so far of this game. All other impressions pretty much raved about the controls feeling just like RE4 (a good thing imo). And the atmosphere being amazing. Guess we'll see soon enough when it releases.